October 28, 2006

Brutal Brawl.Technology stocks will continue to recover, but some sectors willthrive while others struggle, Barron's reports. A Seligman portfoliomanager with a stellar track record among large tech funds names companies helikes -- and which ones he's steering clear of.

Canadian Sunrise. Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE CNQ), one of the largest independent oil and gascompanies, is gearing up to start spinning Alberta's oil sands intogold. Barron's takes a closer look -- and offer predictions for thecompany's shares.

Long-Distance Winner. Investors focused on Tellabs Inc. (Nasdaq TLAB)' expected fourth-quarter earningsshortfall are being too short-sighted. The more important story is that thecompany is at the heart of some of the fastest-growing areas of thetelecom market. Barron's explains.

October 27, 2006

As you are no doubt aware, we have begun to invite our first U.S. advertisers to upgrade to the New Sponsored Search platform. We know that many of our advertisers are already excited about the new system, and we obviously have a lot to tell you about the upgrade process, the new features and tools, and other news of interest to businesses who market online.

As we developed the new platform, we determined that we needed a completely new way of talking with our advertisers...a pipeline in which information and ideas could move in both directions between you and us. We also wanted to create a place where online businesses could begin to think beyond search, and consider how many online advertising vehicles work together.

Thus, it gives us great pleasure to announce the launch of the Yahoo! Search Marketing blog at http://ysmblog.com/. This blog is intended to be a holistic marketing resource for online businesses, in which you'll find the latest information on the upgrade, tools and tips--but also, in-depth how-to's, advertiser interviews, industry trends, links to articles, and other news and information you can use.

The community that a blog engenders is equally important to us. Through the comments section of each post, readers will be able to share their opinions and ideas with folks here at Yahoo! and other online marketers. The blog offers a direct pipeline to Yahoo! execs, and provides you with an opportunity to help shape future product offerings. We pledge to regularly respond to comments and questions in an honest and direct way.

We invite you to visit http://ysmblog.com/ frequently, or better yet, to add it to your My Yahoo! page or to your RSS feeds to get up-to-date information for and about marketers just like you. We intend for the blog to grow and mature over time, and we hope to receive a lot of suggestions and comments that will help us make it even more useful to the community. So please, let us know what you think!

Voters in Brazil are demonstrating what a class struggle is like. According to the Journal,

One evening last week, Danielle Tristão walked into a bar in a tony neighborhood of this seaside city wearing a T-shirt emblazoned "Lula Yes." She was declaring her support for Brazil's blue-collar president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who is a heavy favorite to win re-election on Sunday but is despised by Brazil's upper crust. Ms. Tristão, who is 38 years old, said hostile patrons were soon pelting her with fliers for Mr. da Silva's centrist opponent, Geraldo Alckmin, and even scuffling with her. In the melee, one of the customers bit off part of Ms. Tristão's left ring finger.

President George Bush likes to keep an eye on his ranch using Google Earth (Nasdaq GOOG) according to this interview.

"Occasionally," Mr Bush told MSNBC's Maria Bartiromo. "One of the things I've used on the Google is to pull up maps. It's very interesting to see that. I forgot the name of the program, but you get the satellite and you can - like, I kind of like to look at the ranch on Google, reminds me of where I want to be sometimes. Yeah, I do it some."

Google Earth's online images of the president's Texas ranch show a main compound with two outbuildings and what appears to be an outdoor swimming pool.

And he is no Al Gore. Not only did he not invent the Internet, he doesn't use email:

Mr Bush, in common with other world leaders, said he drew the line at using personal email, fearing the consequences of creating an electronic paper trail.

"I tend not to email," he said, before clarifying his position. "Not only tend not to email, I don't email, because of the different record requests that can happen to a president. I don't want to receive emails because, you know, there's no telling what somebody's email may - it would show up as, you know, a part of some kind of a story, and I wouldn't be able to say, 'Well, I didn't read the email'. 'But I sent it to your address, how can you say you didn't?' So, in other words, I'm very cautious about emailing."

The Nielsen NetRatings data for finance sites is out today. The top finance sites are Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq YHOO), MSN by Microsoft Corporation (Nasdaq MSFT), and AOL Time Warner Inc. (Nasdaq TWX). You can see that the top 3 sites are basically neck and neck with each other.

Top 10 Online Financial News and Information Destinations Week ending September 24, 2006 US, Home and Work

The world's largest IPO by China's largest bank, Industrial Commercial Bank of China (Shanghai 601398), raised $19.1 billion and on its first day the stock traded 2,147,483,647 shares in Shanghai Stock Exchange - that's 2 billion shares! The stock priced at $3.12 and the first trade was $3.40 with a high of 3.26-3.44. The stock was as up as much as 10% on the day, but closed up 5%.

ICBC was also listed in Hong Kong and there the shares were priced at $3.07. The stock closed up 15% in Hong Kong. In Hong Kong, ICBC (Hong Kong 1398) traded between 3.49-3.63 to close at 3.52 (+.45). It goes to show that the Hong Kong and Shanghai markets are not fully market efficient and the market segmentation theory is well and alive.

I just read that TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. (Nasdaq AMTD) made an $8 million screw up with client accounts last quarter. Ameritrade says their data provider provided them with bad data and their clients were short stock after a stock split - they must have been short alot of shares.

"Expenses before advertising were $255 million for the quarter. The primary difference was in other expense, which was $8 million higher, predominantly as a result of a stock split, where we received inaccurate information from a third party which ultimately resulted in our clients being short shares of the company that split. As an accommodation to those clients who acted on this information, we made them whole, costing us $6 million. Processes have been changed to mitigate this type of risk going forward," Bill Gerber, chief financial officer of TD Ameritrade, said on his company's earnings conference call on October 24th.

When I read that note, I could only scratch my head. Goes to show that this stock market is really moving. I wonder what stock it was.

October 26, 2006

The list of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE GS) partners every year should be closely guarded even after it is released because this list is the list of New York's newly rich - and for those who are single, the most eligible bachelors and bachelorettes in New York. This year, 115 new Goldman Sachs lifers won the Goldman Sachs Lottery.Telemarketers and wealth management gurus and bachelors and bachelorettes, please head here for the list of new Goldman Sachs partners. They also announced the list of new managing directors, but I say that is just the consolation prize. After all, if you are a big ego lifer at Goldman Sachs where you have been pedding cheap stocks and dirty laundry companies to retirees and investors and pensions for the last decade, who wants managing director? For all the toil and the moral turpitudes you've had to commit, managing director, what me lucky? No. You want to be Partner. Haha. :-)

Anyway, here's the list of new Goldman Sachs partners. If you are a telemarketer or spammer selling tax shelters and movie deals, there are plenty of ways to find their names and addresses and phone numbers. (Find names and addresses of them using PeopleBot, a free people finder) Be ready to sell for your dear life. These people are worth at least $7 million a year or should I say that Goldman Sachs partners win on average $7 million from squeezing investors out of their hard earned retirement money, which is alot more fun than playing poker in Vegas.

If you are a telemarkter, I would recommend that you have the courtesy to only call them during dinner time, when they are most likely not to be at home. Why? Because they wouldn't be Goldman Sachs partners if they had time for dinner with the wife and kids. And if they are, then you can report that the offending culprit for un Goldman like conduct to Lloyd Blankfein - who I prefer to call Lord Frankenstein. It rhymes doesn't it? It's dsylexic. I know.

By the way, do you like my tower? I built it. It's called the Tower of Babel - combination fallic symbol, office tower, slash headquarters of Goldman Sachs in Jersey (the tallest building in the state of New Jersey). Well, enough is enough of this Goldman babel. Without further adue ...

We are pleased to announce that the following individuals have been invited to become Partners of the firm as of November 25, 2006, the start of our next fiscal year.

It seems like every retail concept that is hot in the US is being exported to China. Home Inns and Hotels Management Inc. (Nasdaq HMIN) which went public today on Nasdaq is the latest. Its business model is to replicate Best Western International Inc. in China - clean rooms at affordable prices for business travelers. Even the logo looks like Best Western's. Nice huh?

Home Inns closed up 63% (+8.70) to close at $22.50. The 7.9 million American Depositary Share (ADS) offering, which represents an almost 25 percent stake in the company, sold for $13.80 per share compared with a forecast range of $10 to $12. The IPO pricing valued the company at $890 million - or roughly $10 million per hotel. Rich? Yes. This is China we're talkin about. Not America, so the model builds in aggressive assumptions for growth. Net income for the hotel chain, which operates 82 budget hotels in China, jumped to 20.9 million yuan ($2.6 million) last year from 1.5 million yuan in 2003 as it targets Chinese travelers spending 150-300 yuan ($18-$35) per night. For those who are trying to dig into the mechanics of this deal, two ordinary shares are equivalent to 1 ADR share and there are 64,470,129 ordinary shares outstanding. Try ploughing through the S-1 for Home Inns.

According to Home Inns, Home Inns was founded in 2002 with a ground breaking vision of a new kind of comfortable lodging experience throughout China. With professional and courteous service, comfortable rooms, convenient locations, and prices that make sense for individual business and leisure travelers, Home Inns is helping to redefine travel in China for the 21st century.

When you visit a Home Inns hotel anywhere in China-be it in the modern metropolis of Shanghai, or the comparatively provincial city of Zhengzhou-you will be greeted by the same comforts as you would expect to find in your own home. From our comfortable beds and pillows and free in-room broadband internet access, air conditioning and water coolers in every room, to our modern bath rooms, complete with complimentary bathroom kit and fresh bath towels, Home Inns ensures that every traveler has a restful, productive stay, no matter where their travels take them in China.

The hot thing to do on European trips is to visit brothels in Pompeii. This business certainly qualifies as the oldest one in the world.

The Lupanare — which derives its name from the Latin word "lupa," or "prostitute" — was presented to the public again Thursday following a yearlong, $253,000 restoration to clean up its frescoes and fix the structure.

Pompeii was destroyed in A.D. 79 by a cataclysmic eruption of Mount Vesuvius that killed thousands of people — and buried the city in 20 feet of volcanic ash, preserving Pompeii for 1,600 years and providing precious information on what life was like in the ancient world.

Among the buildings was the two-story brothel with 10 rooms — five on each floor — and a latrine. Each room on the ground floor bears a fresco of a different sex scene painted over its door — possibly suggesting the prostitute's specialty.

When you run out of options for growth, go to China. That is the strategy at Ford Motor Company (NYSE F). Bill Ford says that over the next 10 years, 90% of the volume growth in cars will come from Asia. That is incredible and shows where the most dramatic amount of wealth creation in human history will occur.

Ford Motor Chairman Bill Ford Jr., touring two factories that the company is building with partner Mazda Motor in China, said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal that his company has no choice but to look outside the U.S. for growth. One of the factories will make engines, and the other will make parts, and production is scheduled to begin next year. Ford also is opening a research-and-development center in Australia and considering expanded production in India. "Ninety percent of all volume growth over the next 10 years will be in Asia," Mr. Ford said. "We're positioning ourselves to profit from that." He said that Ford would even consider manufacturing small cars in China for sale in the U.S. and other markets. "It's certainly possible," he said. "We don't have any plans now. But we'll look at everything." He also said that Ford, which reported a huge quarterly loss earlier this week, is on solid footing financially and doesn't need to seek out an alliance partner.

This is full of irony. Once, awed executives of Japan's Toyota Motor Corp. toured Ford's massive Rouge factory near Dearborn hoping to learn how to match the U.S. company's manufacturing prowess. When the dust settles from its latest restructuring, Ford could sell fewer vehicles in the U.S. than Toyota does.

And get this. Ford expects to buy between $2.6 billion and $3 billion of auto parts in China this year for use in its assembly operations in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere, up from between $1.6 billion and $1.7 billion in 2005. Mr. Ford said he expects that upward trend to continue.

These are the stocks that are good buys. Tech stocks are beating earnings again today and it looks like a positive earnings season across the board from wireless software to restaurant software to software downloading software! Software, software, software! It's hot again. Just look at Openwave Systems Inc. (Nasdaq OPWV) which came out with earnings. The company reported revenue of $91.2 million compared with $103.3 million last year. On average, analysts polled by Thomson Financial expected sales of $88 million. That dog of a stock has finally wagged its tail for investors after several dismal quarters.

Even low tech companies like Deckers OutDoor Corporation (Nasdaq DECK) beat earnings. Deckers Outdoor Corp. after Thursday's closing bell reported third-quarter net earnings of $10.6 million, or 83 cents a share, up 30% from $8.15 million, or 63 cents a share, during the year-ago period. The Goleta, Calif.-based footwear company posted revenue of $82.3 million vs. $69.2 million. Analysts polled by Thomson First Call had forecast third-quarter earnings of 54 cents a share on revenue of $74 million. Additionally, Deckers said it now expects fourth-quarter per-share earnings of $1.27 to $1.30 on revenue of $107 million to $110 million. The company had previously forecast per-share earnings of $1.23 to $1.26 on revenue of $103 million to $106 million. For 2006, Deckers said it now sees per-share earnings of $2.75 to $2.78 on revenue of $287 million to $290 million.

Micros Systems Inc. (Nasdaq MCRS) which makes point of sales systems reported revenue for the quarter was $173.7 million, an increase of $21.7 million, or 14.3%, over the same period last year. Revenue exceeded consensus expectations and was above MICROS's first quarter guidance.

Finally, you have Digital River Inc. (Nasdaq DRIV). Digital River Inc., which builds and manages online businesses for more software publishers and other customers, said Thursday third-quarter earnings rose 20 percent and the company raised its full-year outlook. Quarterly net income climbed to $14.8 million, or 33 cents per share, compared to a profit of $12.4 million, or 31 cents per share during the same period last year. Excluding amortization of acquisition-related intangibles and stock-options expenses, the company earned 41 cents per share in the latest quarter.

Here's a fun fact: 60% of companies monitor external (incoming and outgoing) e-mail as a way to protect against intruders, leaks, and offensive content. However, only 27% monitor internal messages (employee to employee messages), but that number is steadily growing as more and more companies are facing e-mail harassment suits.

Why Are Employees monitoring your email?In its landmark 7-2 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that employers are responsible for harassment — even if they are not aware that it is going on. Specifically, employers may be held liable if the employer “should have known of the conduct and fails to take immediate and appropriate corrective action.” (Burlington Industries v. Ellerth and Faragher v. City of Boca Raton)

The “should have known” standard is particularly troublesome when harassment involves email. How can a company know about every email message from its employees when thousands of messages are sent every day? Which messages should the company know about?

Sixty percent of companies monitor external (incoming and outgoing) e-mail as a way to protect against intruders, leaks, and offensive content. However, only 27% monitor internal messages (employee to employee messages), but that number is steadily growing as more and more companies are facing e-mail harassment suits.

The liability for not knowing about email harassment can be substantial.

The good news is that the U.S. Supreme Court said that penalties and fines could be lessened if the companies exercised “reasonable care” to prevent and correct harassment. (Burlington Industries v. Ellerth and Faragher v. City of Boca Raton)

Many harassment suits are now focused on whether companies exercised "reasonable care." Many companies compound their risk by the mistakes they make when handling email. Fortunately, there are steps that you can take.

Google Inc. (Nasdaq GOOG) spends millions of dollars on food each year running its kitchen for its employees. Google feeds its employees very well. How much does it spend? And, why does Google feed its employees beyond saving employees time away for lunch?

One word: Taxes. When Google spends money on food, it is a pre-tax expense. That means it is spending money that would reduce its profits and therefore the amount of taxes it would have to pay to Uncle Sam. There is a very good tax argument for giving employees free food.

When Google spends $1 of pre-tax dollars on food, that $1 is actually worth more than $1 to employees. Why? When you spend your money on food, you are spending after-tax dollars.

For every dollar you earn, you only keep $.70 if you are taxed at 30%. That means every after tax dollar you spend is actually worth $1/$.70 = $1.42 pre-tax.

Every dollar of money Google spends on food is actually an additional $1.42 of pre-tax compensation. That is how Google is giving employees free money.

If you are a shareholder, you should be asking: How much are employees getting in terms of food subsidy every year? After all, it's your money. If every meal costs $15 and on average employees get fed 300 days per year, that is an additional $4500 of pre-tax dollars for Google. For the employee, that is actually worth

$4500/.70 = $6428 of additonal pre-tax compensation

So, Google is spending close to $6428 per employee.

As of the end of the quarter September 30, 2006, there were 9378 full-time employees. My estimate is that Google spends $60 million on food every year.

October 25, 2006

In the browser wars, Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq YHOO) has clearly sided with Microsoft Corporation (Nasdaq MSFT) while Google Inc. (Nasdaq GOOG) has sided with FireFox. We may be in for the browser wars part 2. On Yahoo!, you will find little boxes promoting Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 stating "Yahoo! recommends that you update your browser. The new, safer Internet Explorer 7." When users click on the link, they get sent to the IE download page.

Why is Yahoo! promoting Internet Explorer 7?It's because Yahoo! wants to set your default home page to Yahoo.com. Also, each installation of IE comes with Yahoo! toolbar which has Yahoo! search built in. Each time you search with IE, you will be sent to Yahoo which makes money off search queries.

Why is Google siding with FireFox?On the other hand, Google has been aggressively promoting FireFox and even paying affiliates of AdSense for installations of FireFox as part of Google pact. It is quite clear that Google sees the browser becoming of renewed importance - kind of poetic since Google made search important again. Google is promoting FireFox because Google Search box is embedded in the FireFox browser by default. When you search, Google makes money by default. Also, the default home page of FireFox, the FireFox Start Page, is a Google search box.So, you see it is all about search. Now that search is hot again, owning the browser and being

By far the most innovative way of stealing from stores like Wal-mart Stores and Target is to actually buy them for far less than they are worth. Want to steal stuff from Wal-mart Stores Inc. (NYSE WMT) and Target Corporation (NYSE TGT)? Apparently, high tech thieves are printing out bar codes of cheap products like headsets, going to Walmart and Target, and sticking them on expensive electronics like iPods.

One guy stole Legos:He pilfered the toys by creating counterfeit bar codes that allowed $100 Lego sets, for example, to be rung up for just $19. Then he resold them on a Web site for toy collectors.

Another guy and his wife stole Dyson vacuum cleaners:Over six months in 2004, Thomas Westwood, his wife, Jennifer, and mother-in-law, Kathleen Dodson, worked the bar-code scam at Target stores. Using a computer, they scanned bar codes from relatively inexpensive Target items and printed out copies. Then they returned to the store and pasted the fakes onto expensive Dyson vacuum cleaners, DVD players and phones. Cashiers dutifully rang up the wrong prices.

Yet another college student stole an iPod by downloading a barcoding program from the Internet called:Last December, a Target security guard nabbed a Colorado college student after he purchased a $150 iPod that carried a bar code for $4.99 headphones, according to Mr. Brekke. The thief had fashioned the fake label with a $25 software program called Barcode Magic, which he'd downloaded from the Internet, Mr. Brekke says.

But it doesn't always have to be hi-tech:Bruce and Laura Wasz, a mother-and-son team, ran an 11-person theft ring in Illinois. They paid people to hit home-improvement chains such as The Home Depot Inc. (NYSE HD) and Sears Holdings Corporation (Nasdaq SHLD) the Great Indoors. The thieves stole the old-fashioned way, simply sneaking things out the doors. Accomplices ripped off entire truckloads of products such as chain saws.

They stored the stuff in three shuttered pawn shops and unloaded it on eBay, using numerous different account names, according to Brian Hayes, an assistant U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois. "They held themselves out as honest dealers," says Mr. Hayes. Investigators later determined that in 2003 they sold more than $2 million of sump pumps, Koehler faucets, mosquito exterminators, snow blowers and other merchandise.

The China rumor mill is busy at work. The rumor of the hour is that The9 Limited (ADR) (Nasdaq NCTY) is considering acquiring 9You (which means "Long Game" in Chinese). Insiders are asking for for US$100 million from The9 Limited. 9you CEO Wang Zijie replied that the rumor is 100 percent impossible and not worth further comment. If any similar takeover were to occur in the future, it would more likely be 9you acquiring The9, Wang said. Dragon Groove, which invested US$5 million in 9you in 2005, is considering exiting from its investment in 9you. Dragon Groove head Sun Taicang is reportedly leading 9you's listing plan. The9 had no comment on the rumor.

Is this deal possible?The9 has a market capitalization of $570 million and cash on hand of $83 million in the most recent quarter so it certainly is possible if it is done with cash and stock. It may require some additional share issuances.

What would the deal bring to The9?According to 9You, 9You is the largest operator of online music games, China’s biggest casual game operator,one of biggest interactive entertainment portal sites in China, which is the first to integrate online game services (MMORPG, massive and medium size casual games, mobile game, etc.), fashional digital entertainment contents, a variety of chatting and community services equipped with Avatar System, wireless value-added services and other premiere services to the Chinese language internet users all over the world. With its wide-coverage for all major types of user needs related with digital entertainment service, the 9you.com represents the latest service style and the newest trend for the digital entertainment provider business in China Market. A series of awards and ranking are obtained by 9you.com in 2005 which include Top 10 Online Game Operator in China, and Top 10 Online Game Developer in China, the Cool Company,Shanghai First-class Service Brand in Information Service Industry, etc.

Who will make money?The major investors of Nineyou are several leading international venture capital funds, including the Carlyle Group, which is the world’s largest private fund investment group, China Merchant Fortune Ventures, and Dragon Groove Inc. who has the background as international strategic investor.

Oak Pacific Interactive acquired Xiaonei, a Chinese Facebook clone. The price was not disclosed by judging from the words coming out of Oak Pacific Interactive, it was in the single millions. According to Shanghai Youth Daily, Chinese campus social networking site Xiaonei.com and will integrate the site with its own campus community site 5Q.com, reports Shanghai Youth Daily. Xiaonei was founded in December 2005 and has over 300,000 users to date. Xiaonei's website is almost an exact copy of US campus networking site Facebook. Xiaonei founder Wang Xing will join Oak Pacific Interactive.

There are differing views on the exact number of users that Xiaonei actually has. Red Herring says: Xiaonei has 1 million users. Judging from the Alexa traffic data, the number of active daily users is probably closer to 300,000 users. The site appears to have grown steadily since January. You can see from the Alexa graph that there was a spike in users due to the recent acquisition by Oak in late October. However, what is noticeably missing is the surge in users that you would expect from back to school in the September time frame.

October 24, 2006

I am hearing from sources that FaceBook will be partnering with The Walt Disney Company's (NYSE DIS) ESPN to offer newsheadlines and sports scores to FaceBook users. Through the deal, FaceBook users will have access to updated sports scores and news about their favorite teams. FaceBook is leveraging its college fanbase and becoming a media and content distribution company. Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq YHOO) and Google Inc. (Nasdaq GOOG) should take note of this partnership.I would say the deal with ESPN is a very big endorsement of the attractiveness of the FaceBook demographic and its success as a media channel. The deal brings together college kids and sports which just make so much sense. It's like dowsing a fire with oil. It's hot.

How much is the deal worth? Considering the reach of FaceBook at 30 billion page views, I would put my finger that the deal is worth $10 million in annual revenue. It is not too much in terms of moving the revenue needle for FaceBook but it does show that the cool Internet companies are no longer simply the gang of four which was formerly known as MAGY (MSN, AOL, Yahoo, Google). The center of power of the Internet is shifting and skewing younger and younger. That is the power of mass adoption. That is why FaceBook is doing a deal with ESPN.

Potentially, this deal could extend much further. Considering that Disney does not have a strong portal, could Disney become a potential acquirer of Facebook? With cartoon, animations, movies and theme parks geared towards kids and teens, that certainly makes it an interesting piece of food for thought! I wonder what they think at Disney and at FaceBook.

You can always count on Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq AMZN) provider of Earth's Largest Selection to squeeze the shorts. The stock is up 13% (+4.98) at $38.31 after investors learned that things weren't falling apart as quickly. According to the press release, earnings slid but they made it up in volume. Isn't that a great business model? Sales were up 24%. The truth is that this current squeeze after hours isn't all that bad considering we had a decent earnings report. One look at the big old Amazon's historical shorts shows how bad short squeezes can get. This is the Amazon that brought Henry Blodgett who pinned a $500 target on the stock to fame - and hit it too! According to Nasdaq, there were 46.3 million shares short as of the end of September 15, 2006 (via). Based on trading volume of 6.6 million shares, it would take 6.5 days to cover. As of 5 pm, 8.7 million shares have traded after hours. Happy covering!

GateHouse Media Inc. (NYSE GHS) owns a chain of regional newspapers and its IPO just priced tonight at $18 per share (at the top of the range of $16-18). They sold 40% of the company and 13.8 million shares. The underwriters were Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE GS) and Wachovia Securities (NYSE WB).

Gatehouse was formed last year when a New York investment firm purchased Liberty Publishing Group. It recently bought two Massachusetts community newspapers for $413 million, including The Patriot Ledger of Quincy and The Enterprise of Brockton. The IPO proceeds were $248.4 million which means it is yet another private equity deal whose IPO will pay for a large portion of the purchase price.The pricing gives the company an initial market capitalization of about $621 million. The Fairport, New York-based company plans to use net proceeds from the offering to repay debt. GateHouse Media has a portfolio of 423 community publications and more than 230 related Web sites. Its core products are 75 daily newspapers, 231 weekly newspapers, and 117 shoppers, which are generally advertising-only publications.

You can see from the map that most of Gatehouse Media's papers are based in the mid West and the Eastern seaboard. The company has 3900 employees and was founded in 1997.The Gatehouse at The Bishop's Palace Wells in Somerset.

So, what exactly is a Gatehouse? According to Wikipedia, A gatehouse is a feature of European castles and mansions. Gatehouses were first constructed in the second half of the 16th century in England when the entrance gateway, which formed part of the principal front of the earlier feudal castles, became a detached feature attached to the mansions only by a wall enclosing the entrance court. The gatehouse then constituted a structure of some importance, and included sometimes many rooms. At a later period smaller accommodation was provided so that it virtually became a lodge, but being designed to harmonize with the mansion it presented sometimes a monumental structure.

Two thousand years after building the Great Wall of China, China is building the Green Wall of China to block dust storms from entering Northern China and Mongolia. Dust storms have ravaged Beijing every year and covered the city in a layer of sand and the sand storms are getting worse.So, what is the Green Wall?

Dust storms cover Beijing with layers of silt and sand. It's great for the car wash business.

More than 2,000 years ago, China began to build the Great Wall. Today, Mongolia is building its own seemingly implausible version: a zigzagging line of pines, willows, oleasters, junipers, hawthorns, aspens and other trees it hopes will someday stretch more than 2,000 miles across the desert. The so-called "Green Wall" is expected to take 30 years to complete and cost some $150 million or more.

This golfer is enjoying a sand storm in Beijing while practicing at the driving range. The Green Wall will undoubtedly improve the golf business.

The problem is becoming very severe in Mongolia.The amount of Mongolia's land that is suffering from desertification -- land that either has no vegetation at all or is slowly losing it -- could be as much as 50,000 square miles, an area the size of New York state, according to a leading Mongolian environmental group called Sain Uils, which means "good will" in Mongolian. Mongolia's Ministry of Nature and Environment says 683 rivers have dried up in recent years due to encroaching desert.China is also building a big wall.The plan is known as the Green Great Wall - a 2,800-mile network of forest belts designed to stop the sands. Chinese scientists from the Ministry of Forestry believe the trees can serve as a windbreak and halt the advancing desert. In a recent report to the United Nations, Chinese officials predicted that the effort will "terminate expansion of new desertification caused by human factors" within a decade. By 2050, they claim, much of the arid land can be restored to a productive and sustainable state.It will cost alot of money.

Possibly the largest proposed ecological project in history, the new Great Wall calls for planting more than 9 million acres of forest at a cost of up to $8 billion. The project began last year as the fourth phase of an afforestation program launched in 1978. By 2010, the green belts are expected to stretch from outer Beijing through Inner Mongolia. To build the wall, the government has launched a two-pronged plan: Use aerial seeding to cover wide swaths of land where the soil is less arid, and pay farmers to plant trees and shrubs in areas that require closer attention. A $1.2 billion oversight system, consisting of mapping and land-surveillance databases, will be implemented. The government has also hammered out a dust-monitoring network with Japan and Korea.

The wall itself will be made up of an outer belt - ranging from 775 to 1,765 feet wide - with a sand fence along the perimeter. Inside, low-lying, sand-tolerant vegetation, arranged in optimized checkerboard patterns, will create an artificial ecosystem to stabilize the dunes. A 6-foot-wide gravel platform will hold sand down and encourage a soil crust to form. The government has also funded research to explore the use of genetically engineered plants, chemical dune stabilization, grass strains bred in space, and even farming techniques that will allow rice to grow in sandy soil.

Can an expansive row of trees and some strategically placed grass really stave off an encroaching desert? It worked before. In 1935, overgrazing and drought caused 850 million tons of topsoil to blow off the United States' southern Plains, leaving 4 million acres barren and creating the Dust Bowl. To address the problem, the newly formed Soil Conservation Service introduced the Shelterbelt Project - a 100-mile-wide strip of native trees bisecting the country from Canada to Texas. In a few years, it helped to reduce the amount of airborne soil by 60 percent.